.MM 



RISE AND PROGRESS 



OP THE 



BLOODY OUTBREAK 



AT 



HARPER'S FERRY. 



" So incompatible are the two systems, that every new State makes its first political act a choice 
of the one, and an exclusion of the other, even at the cost of civil wak, if necessary. 

"They who think that it is accidental, unnecessary, the work of interested or fanatical agitators, 
and therefore ephemeral, mistake the case altogether. It is an irrepressible conflict beiweon op- 
posing and enduring forces, and it means that the United States must and will, sooner or later, 
become entirely a slaveholding nation or entirely a free labor nation. 

Hon. William H. Sewabd's Speech at Rochester. 



Read the followbg pages, and reflect upon their fearful import, as 
exemplified in the recent Harper's Ferry rebellion, before voting at 
the comino; Election. . . . . , •"..,., . -„ , . 



PUBLISHED BY DIRECTION OF THE 

NEW YORK DEMOCRATIC VIGILANT ASSOCIATION. 



JOHN F. TROW, PRINTER, 879 BROADWAY. 



[^ 












At a meeting of the Executive Committee of the New York Demo- 
cratic Vigilant Association, held on the 18th inst., a committee was 
unanimously appointed, on motion of Mr. Royal Phelps, " to collect 
the details of the history of the affair at Harper's Ferry ; and, if it prove 
that there be any connection between the conspirators and any political 
body at the North, that sum of money be appropriated to dis- 
seminate the fects, and to make known to our Southern brethren our 
utter condemnation of the instigators of the movement." 

In accordance with this resolution, the committee, consisting of 
Messrs. Watts Sherman, Royal Phelps and S. L. M. Barlow, submitted, 
at a meeting which was convened on the 25th inst., the following 
address to the people for consideration. It was unanimously resolved 
that it should be printed in pamphlet form, and in the newspapers, and 
extensively circulated, under the authority of the Democratic Vigilant 
Association, whose Executive Committee consists of the following 
gentlemen : — 



WATTS SHERMAN, 
JAMES LEE, 
ALGERNON S. JARVIS, 
B. M. WHITLOCK, 
CHARLES A. LAMONT, 
JOEL WOLFE, 
SAMUEL L. M. BARLOW, 
REUBEN WITHERS, 
GEORGE J. FORREST, 
N. W. CHATER, 
ARTHUR LEARY, 
GEORGE C. COLLIN^ 
JAMES OLWELL 
b/n. FOX, 
JOHN MCKESSON, 



ISAAC TOWNSEND, 
THOMAS F. YOUNGS, 
STEPHEN JOHNSON, 
JOEL CONKLIN, 
SCHUYLER LIVINGSTON, 
J. T. SOUTTER, 
BENJAMIN H. FIELD, 
MOSES TAYLOR, 
ROYAL PHELPS, 
E. K. ALBURTIS, 
WILLIAM T. COLEMAN, 
JOHN T. AGNEW, 
GEORGE GREER, 
JOHN W. CULBERT, 
HENRY YELVERTON. 



RISE AND PROGRESS OF THE HARPER'S 
FERRY REBELLION. 

FELLOW-CiTiZEisrs : — The community was thrown into 
consternation, on the 17th instant, by the appalling intel- 
ligence that a formidable outbreak, headed by Northern 
abolitionists, had broken out at Harper's Ferry, in Vir- 
ginia, with the avowed object of arousing the colored 
population of the South to take up arms against their 
masters. It resulted in the sacrifice of valuable lives, and 
the destruction of private and public property ; but it 
failed of success, and most of those who actively partici- 
pated in it, were slain, or taken prisoners. Had the ex- 
pectations of its leaders been fulfilled, a portion of the 
Southern States would now be under the scourge of a 
hideous uprising of brutality and ignorance against civili- 
zation, involving fearful deeds of blood, rapine and out- 
rage, which it sickens the imagination to dwell upon. 

Short-lived, and contracted in locality, as the Harper s 
Ferry reljellion was, such deep and enduring results, for 
good or evil, cannot fail to spring from it, that it is essen- 
tial for every conservative citizen to understand its true 
import. We therefore request a careful perusal of the 
following outline of its history, and that every one who 
cherishes the peace and welfare of his country, will pon- 
der over the truths it teaches, before voting at the coming 



election. It will appear that Northern abolitionists have 
long contemplated a war of races ; that preparations for 
it have been slowly and deliberately made ; that the re- 
cent invasion of the South was not intended to be an 
isolated one ; that its active agents were supplied with 
money and arms from the Kansas Free Soil State fund, 
and by sympathizers in the North ; and that the docu- 
ments exposing their rules of future action, are founded 
upon the principles laid down in the speech delivered by 
the Hon. William H. Seward, at Rochester, on the 25th 
of October, 1858. You will be called upon, on the Yth 
of November next, to signify by your vote, your approval 
or rejection of these pernicious principles ; and we ask you 
to reflect, before giving them your endorsement, upon the 
calamities which would flow from their a'doption. 

It has been discovered that a Central Association was 
organized, some time ago, which adopted the folloTvdng, 
plan for the abolition of slavery. Among its founders 
were Mr. John Brown — ^known familiarly as " Ossawa- 
tornie" Brown — Mr. H. Kagi, Gerrit Smith, and many 
others, some of whom, as has been revealed, subsequently 
established subsidiary associations, in different towns and 
cities of the country : — 

When a human being is set i^pon by a robber, ravisher, murderer or tyrant, 
of any kind, it is the duty of tlie bystanders to go to his or her rescue, l)y 
force^ if need, le. 

In general, nothing will excuse men in the non-performance of this duty, 
except the pressure of higher duties, (if such there be,) inability to afford 
relief, or too great danger to themselves or others. 

This duty being naturally inherent in human relations and necessities, 
governments and laws are of no authority in opposition to it. If they inter- 
pose themselves, they must be trampled under foot without ceremony, as we 
would trample under foot laws that should forbid us to rescue men from wild 
beasts or from burning buildings. 

On this principle, it is the duty of the non-slaveholders of this country, in 
their lirivate capacity as individuals — without asking the permission or Avait- 
ing the movements of the government — to fjo to the rescue of the slaves from 
the hands of their oppressors. 



Tliis duty is so self-evident and natural a one, tliat he who pretends to 
doubt it should be regarded either as seeking to evade it, or as himself a servile 
and ignorant slave of corrupt institutions or customs. 

Molding these opinions^ we •propose to act upon them. And we invite ail 
other citizens of the United States to join us in the enterprise. To enable 
them to judge of its feasibility, we lay before them the following programme 
of measures, which, we think, ought to be adopted, and would be suc- 
cessful : — 

1. The formation of associations, throughout the country, of all persons 
who are willing to pledge themselves publicly to favor the enterprise, and 
render assistance and support, of any kind, to it. 

2. Establishing or sustaining papers to advocate the enterprise. 

3. Refusing to vote for any person, for any civil or military office whatever, 
who is not publicly committed to the enterprise. 

4. Raising money and military equip>ments. 

5. Forming and disciplining such military companies as may volunteer 
for actual service. 

6. Detaching the non-slaveholders of the South from all alliance with the 
slaveholders, and inducing them to co-operate with us, by appeals to their 
safety, interest, honor, justice, and humanity. 

7. Informing the slaves (by emissaries to ie sent among them, or through 
the non-slaveholders of the South) of the plan of emancipation, that they may 
he prepared to co-operate at the proper time. 

8. To encourage emigration to the South of persons favoring the move- 
ment. 

9. When the preceding preliminaries shall have sufficiently prepared the 
way, then to land military forces (at numerous points at the same time) 
in the South, who shall raise the standard of freedom, and call to it the slaves, 
and such free. persons as may he willing to join it. 

10. If emancipation shall be accomplished only by actual hostilities, then, 
as all the laws of war, of nature and of justice, will require that the emanci- 
pated slaves shall be compensated for their previous wrongs, ice avow it our 
purpose to malce such comiyensation, so far as the property of the slaveholders 
and their aliettors can coinpensate them. And we avow our intention to 
make known this determination to the slaves beforehand, with a view to give 
them courage and self-respect, to nerve them to look boldly into the eyes of 
their tyrants, and to give them true ideas of the relations of justice existing 
between themselves and their oppressors. 

11. To remain in the South, after emancipation, until we shall have estab- 
lished, or have seen established, such governments as will secure the future 
freedom of the persons emancipated. 

And we anticipate that the public avowal of these measures, and our open 
and zealous preparation for them, will have the effect, within some reason- 
able time — we trust within a few years at farthest — to detach the govern- 
ment and the country at large from the interests of the slaveholders ; to 
destroy the security and value of slave proj^erty ; to annihilate the commercial 



/ 6 

credit of the s]a\ e-holders, and Jinally to accomplish the extinction of slavery. 
We hope it may be without blood. 

If it be objected that this scheme proposes war, we confess the fact. It 
does propose war — jjrivate war, indeed — iitt, nevertheless tear, if that shotild 
frove necessary. .And our answer to the objection is, that, in revohitions of 
this nature, it is necessary tliat private individuals should take the first steps. 
The tea must be thrown overboard, the Bastile must be torn down, the first 
gun must be fired, by private persons, before a new government can be 
organized, or the old one be forced (for nothing but danger to itself will force 
it) to adopt the measures which the insurgents have in view. 

If the American governments. State or national, would abolish slavery, 
we would leave the work in their hands. But as they do not, and apparently 
wiU not, we propose to force them to do it, or to do it ourselves in defiance 
of them. 

If any considerable number of the American people will join us, the work 
will be an easy and bloodless one ; for slavery can live only in quiet, and in 
the sympathy or subjection of all around it. 

"We, the subscribers, residents of the town of in the county of 

in the State of believing in the principles, and approving generally of the 

measures, set forth in the foregoing "Plan for the Abolition of Slavery," and 
in the accompanying address " To the Non-Slaveholders of the South," hereby 
unite ourselves in an association to be called the League of Freedom, in the 

town of , for the purpose of aiding to carry said plan into effect. And 

we hereby severally declare it to be our sincere intention to co-operate with 
each other, and with all other associations within the United States, having the 
same purpose in view, and adopting the same platform of principles and 
measures. 

Together with this general plan of association, the 
manner in which its members intended to carry out its 
objects, was drawn np for secret circulation among those 
whom it was hoped would lend it assistance in the South. 
It reads as follows : 

OUE PLAN, THEN, IS — 

1. To make war (openly or secretly, as cn-cumstances may dictate) upon 
the property of the slaveholders and their abettors — not for its destruction, if 
that can easily be avoided, but to convert it to the use of the slaves. If it 
cannot be thus converted, then we advise its destruction. Teach the slaves 
to burn their masters' buildings, to kill their cattle and horses, to conceal or 
destroy farming utensils, to abandon labor in seed time and harvest, and let 
crops perish. Make slavery unprofitable, in this way, if it can be done in no 
other. 

2. To make slaveholders objects of derision and contempt, by flogging 
them, whenever they shall be guilty of flogging their slaves. 



3. To risk no general insurrection until we of the North go to your assis- 
tance, or you are sure of success without our aid. 

4. To cultivate the friendship and confidence of the slaves, to consult 
with them as to their rights and interests, and the means of promoting them ; 
to show your interest in their welfare and your readiness to assist them ; let 
them know that they have your sympathy, and it will give them courage, 
self-respect and ambition, and make men of them— infinitely better men to 
live by, as neighbors and friends, than the indolent, arrogant, selfish, heart- 
less, domineering robbers and tyrants who now keep both yourselves and 
the slaves in subjection, and look with contempt upon all who live by honest 
labor. 

5. To change your political institutions as soon as possible ; and, in the 
mean time, give never a vote to a slaveholder ; pay no taxes to their govern- 
ment if you can either resist or evade them ; as witnesses and jurors, give no 
testimony and no verdicts in support of any slaveholding claims, perform no 
military, patrol or police service; mob slaveholding courts, goals, and 
sheriffs; do nothing, in short, for sustaining slavery, but every thing you 
safely and rightfully can, publicly and privately, for its overthrow. 

The document in question continues : 

We are unwilling to take the responsibility of advising a general insur- 
rection, or any taking of life, until we of the North go down to take part in 
it, in such numbers as to insure a certain and easy victory. "We therefore 
advise that, for the present, operations be confined to the seizure of property, 
and the chastisement of individual slaveholders and their accomplices ; and 
that these things be done only so far as they can be done without too great 
danger to the actors. 

"\Ye specially advise the flogging of individual slaveholders. This is the 
case where the medical principle, that like cures like, will certainly succeed. 
Give the slaveholders, then, a taste of their own whips. Spare their lives, 
but not their backs. The arrogance they have acquired by the use of the 
lash upon others, will be soon taken out of them when the same scourge shall 
be applied to themselves. A band of ten or twenty determined negroes, well 
armed, having their rendezvous in the forests, coming out upon the planta- 
tions by day or night, seizing individual slaveholders, stripping them, and 
flogging them soundly, in the presence of their own slaves, would soon abolish 
slavery over a large district. 

These bands could also do a good work by kidnapping individual slave- 
holders, taking them into the forest, and holding them as hostages for the 
good behaviour of the whites remaining on the plantations ; compelling them 
also to execute deeds of emancijiation, and conveyances of their property to 
their slaves. These contracts could probably never afterward be successfully 
disavowed on the ground of duress, (especially after new governments favor- 
able to liberty should be estaWished,) inasmuch as such contracts would be 
nothing more than justice ; and men may rightfully be coerced to do justice. 



8 

Such contracts would be intrinsically as valid as the treaties by which con- 
quered nations make satisfaction for the injustice which caused the war. 

The more bold and resolute slaves should be encouraged to form them- 
selves into bands, build forts in the forests, and there collect arms, stores, 
horses, everything, that will enable them to sustain themselves, and carry on 
their warfare upon the slaveholders. 

Another important measure, on the part of the slaves, will be to disarm 
their masters, so far as that is practicable, by seizing and concealing their 
weapons, whenever opportunity offers. They should also kill all slave hunt- 
ing dogs, and the owners too, if that should prove necessary. 

"Whenever the slaves on a plantation are not powerful or courageous enough 
to resist, they should be encouraged to desert, in a body, temporarily, es- 
pecially at harvest time, so as to cause the crops to perish for want of hands 
to gather them. 

Many other ways will suggest themselves to you and the slaves, by which 
the slaveholders can be annoyed and injured, without causing any general 
outbreak or shedding of blood. 

The following extracts from a letter from Mr. Gerritt 
Smith, make manifest that the conspirators fully compre- 
hended the awful crimes and calamities — even to the ex- 
tent of " fire, and rape, and slaughters" — ^that must result 
from the successful progress of their undertaking. Under 
date, " Peterboro, August 29, 1859," Mr. Smith writes to 
Mr. John Thomas, of Syracuse, Chairman of the Jerry 
Rescuers, as follows : 

* * * Much is said and written against the breaking of human laws. 
But they are entitled to obedience, only so far as they are one with those 
Divine laws which cannot be broken. " The law of his God," was Daniel's 
only law. ISTo friend of God knows any other law. Apostles answered and 
said : " We ought to obey God rather than men ; " so, too, " Whether it be 
right in the sight of God to hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye." 
How senseless and wicked is this declamation against trampling under foot 
these human laws, that are no laws. * * * j<\^q invasion of human rights 
by government can no more than such invasion by an individual, be law. 
The invaders, be they governments or individuals, are the rebels, and they 
who resist them are the law-abiding. * * * jj; \g^ perhaps, too late to 
bring slavery to an end by peaceable means — too late to vote it down. For 
many years I have feared, and published my fears, that it must go ou ' in 
Mood. My speech in Congress on the Nebraska bill was strongly marked 
with such fears. These fears have grown into belief. So debauched are the 
white people by slavery, that there is not virtue enough left in them to put it 
down. If I do not misinterpret the words and the looks of the most intelli- 



9 

gent and noble of the black men who fall in my way, they have come to 
despair of the accomplishment of this Avork by the white people. The feeling 
among the blacks that they must deliver themselves, gains strength with fear- 
ful rapidity. * * * j^ yy\l\^ in the end, be found to be as vain as it is 
inconsistent, to oppose the extension of slavery into the free States while 
upholding it in the Slave States. Governor Seward was right in saying 
that the States must ultimately all be secured to freedom or given up to 
slavery. * * * 

No wonder, then, is it that in this state of facts which I have sketched, 
intelligent black men in the States and Canada, should see no hope for their 
race in the practice and policy of white men. No wonder they are brought 
to the conclusion that no resource is left to them but in God and insurrections. 
For insurrections, then, we may look any year, any month, any day. A 
terrible remedy for a terrible wrong. But come it must, unless anticipated 
by repentance and the putting away of the terrible wrong. 

It will be said that these insurrections will be failures ; that they will be 
put down. Yes, but will not slavery, nevertheless, be put down by them ; 
for what portions are there of the South that will cling to slavery after two 
or three considerable insurrections shall have filled the whole South with 
horror. And is it entirely certain that these insurrections will be put down 
promptly, and before they can have spread far ? Will telegraphs and railroads 
be too swift for even the swiftest insurrections ? Remember that telegraphs 
and railroads can be rendered useless in an hour. Remember, too, that many, 
who would be glad to face the insurgents, would be busy in transporting tlieir 
wives and daughters to places where they would be safe from that worst fate 
which husbands and fathers can imagine for their wives and daughters. I 
admit that, but for this embarrassment. Southern men would laugh at the idea 
of an insurrection, and would quickly dispose of one. But trembling as they 
would for their beloved ones, I know of no part of the world where, so much 
as in the South, men would be like, in a formidable insurrection, to lose the 
most important time, and be distracted and panic stricken. 

When the day of her calamity shall have come to the South, and Jire and 
rape and slaughters shall be filing up the measure of her affliction, then will 
the North have two reasons for remorse — 

First, That she was not willing (whatever the attitude of the South at this 
point) to share with her in the expense and loss of an immediate and universal 
emancipation. 

Second, That she was not willing to vote slavery out of existence. 

Vague rumors were in circulation, as early as July 
last, tliat an invasion of the South by Northern abolition- 
ists was intended, and that insurrections of slaves were 
impending. They, unfortunately, received no credence, 
or the loss of life by the recent outbreak might have been 
prevented. The following is a copy of an anonymous 



10 

letter upon the subject, wliicli was received by Governor 
Floyd in August : 

" Cincinnati, August 20, 1859. 
" Sir — I have lately received information of a movement of so great im- 
portance that I feel it to he ray duty to impart it to you without delay. I 
have discovered the existence of a secret association, having for its ohject the 
liberation of the slaves at the South by a general insurrection. The leader 
of the movement is old John Brown, late of Kansas. He has been in Canada 
during the winter, drilling the negroes there, and they are only waiting his 
word to start for the South to assist the slaves. They have one of their lead- 
ing men, a white man, in an armory in Maryland ; where it is situated I 
have not been able to learn. As soon as every thing is ready, those of their 
number who are in the Northern States and Canada are to come in small 
companies to their rendezvous, which is in the mountains in Virginia. They 
will pass down through Pennsylvania and Maryland, and enter Virginia at 
Harper's Ferry. Brown left the North about three or four weeks ago, and 
will arm the negroes and strike the blow in a few weeks, so that whatever 
is done must be done at once. They have a large quantity of arms at their 
rendezvous, and are probably distributing them already. As I am not fully 
in their confidence, this is all the information I can give you. I dare not 
sign my name to this, but trust that you will not disregard the warning on 
that account." 

Tlie papers and documents wliicli were seized upon 
the persons of the Harper's Ferry ringleaders, and the 
evidence given by prisoners taken by Colonel Lee, show, 
moreover, that the conspiracy was hatched over a year 
ago; that it had an extensive organization in various 
States, and that leading men of the North, East, and 
West were implicated in it. Letters written to a Mr. 
Forbes, of this city, prove that republican Senators of 
the United States, were made cognizant of the invasion 
intended, but concealed the secret within their own 
breasts, and refrained from divulging it to the public au- 
thorities. The names used by the parties engaged to 
designate the movement are in most instances fictitious. 
It is variously characterized in their correspondence, 
" mining operations," " missionary work," " stock opera- 
tions," and, by Gerritt Smith and others, " Kansas work." 
Thus Mr. Smith writes : 



11 

* Petebbobo', June 4, 1859. 

Oapt. John Brown : — 

My Dear Friend — I wrote you a week ago, directing my letter to the 
care of Mr. Kearney. He replied, informing me that he had forwarded it to 
Washington. But as Mr. Morton received last evening a letter from Mr. 
Sanborn, saying your address would be your son's home — viz : "West Andover 
— I therefore write you without delay, and direct my letter to your son. I 
have done what I could thus far for Kansas, and what I could to keep you at 
your Kansas work. Losses by endorsement and otherwise, have brought me 
under heavy embarrassment the last two years. But I must nevertheless 
continue to do, in order to keep you at your Kansas work. I send you here- 
with my draft for two hundred dollars. Let me hear from you on the receipt 
of this letter. You live in our hearts, and our prayer to God is that you may 
have strength to continue in your Kansas work. My wife joins me in aflfec- 
tionate regard to you, dear John, whom we both hold in very high esteem. 
I suppose you p&t the Whitman note into Mr. Kearney's hands. It will be a 
great shame if Vi.r. Whitman does not pay it. What a noble man is Mr. Kear- 
ney ; how liberally he has contributed to keep you in your Kansas work. 
Your friend, GERRIT SMITH. 

^ The following letter, from a son of Ossawatomie 
Brown, makes it appear that the Hon Joshua R. Gid- 
dings was among the accessories before the fact of the in- 
vasion : 

West Andover, Ashtabula. County, Ohio, ) 
Saturday, Oct 1, 1859. ( 

Friend Henrie : — Since I received Isaac's and yours of Sept. 20, I have 
been making every eifort to raise stock, and am succeeding well. Yesterday 
I sent a draft of $15 to J. M. B., of Chatham, with which to get on another 
hand. Shall soon have enough to send again. Yesterday I returned from a 
trip to Jeiferson and Ashtabula, where I met with some success. Our old 
friend J. R. G. took stock to the amount of $300, and as he was just start- 
ing for Ravenna, said he would form an association there. Monday next I 
shall start for Cleveland. Hope to find a letter from you at Mrs. Sturte- 
vant's. You may depend upon it I have been, and am yet " straining every 
nerve " in furtherance of our cause. (Two phonographic characters which 
might be made to read Parker Pillsbury) is here, and actually working in be- 
half of the mining operation. 

You will have me with you just as soon as I am satisfied I can do more 
and be of more use there than where I am. 

Nothing new of special interest. All well. In haste. Yours, 

JOHN SMITH. 

A conversation has been published between Mr. Val- 
landigham and Brown, since he was taken prisoner, which 
confirms the testimony in the above letter with regard to 



12 

the knowledge of the conspiracy of this Nestor of the 
black republican party in Congress. 

Mr. Vallandigham — Did you see any tiling of Joshua E. Giddings ? 

Mr. Beown — I did meet him. 

Mr. Vallandigham — Did you converse with him ? 

Mr. Brown — I did. I would not tell you, of course, any thing that would 
implicate Mr, Giddings : but I certainly met with him, and had conversations 
with him. 

Mr. Vallandigham — About that rescue case ? 

Mr. Beown — Yes, I did ; I heard him express his opinions upon it very 
freely and frankly. 

Mr. Vallandigham — Justifying it ? 

Mr. Brown — Yes, sir ; I do not compromise him, certainly, in saying 
that. 

Mr. Vallandigham — "Will you answer this : Did you talk with Giddings 
about your expedition here ? 

Mr, Brown — No, I won't answer that, because a denial of it I would 
not make, and to make any affirmation of it I should be a great dunce. 

Mr. Vallandigham — Have you had any correspondence with parties at 
.the North on the subject of this movement ? 

Mr, Brown — I have had correspondence. 

Persons in New York, New Hampshire, Ohio, Mis- 
souri, Canada, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Iowa, and 
Michigan are known, by documentary evidence, to have 
lent aid to the movement, and the prisoners testify that 
the Kansas aid fund paid for the vast amount of ammu- 
nition and firearms with which they were supplied. The 
conspirators had power to appoint officers of various 
grades, and were governed by a regular constitution and 
laws. The following is a copy of one of the commissions 
issued by Mr. John Brown, previous to the rebellion : 

Headqtjarters War Department, ) 
Near Harper's Ferry. J 

Whereas, Jere G. Anderson has been nominated a Captain in the Army, 
established under the "provisional Constitution," 

Now, therefore, in pursuance of the authority vested in us by said Con- 
stitution, we do hereby appoint and commission the said Jere G. Anderson a 
Captain. 

Given at the office of the Secretary of War, this day, Oct, 15, 1859. 

JOHN BROWN, Commander in Chief. ^ 

H. Kagi, Secretary of War, 



13 

Mr. Brown made his first appearance in Harper's 
Ferry more than a year ago, accompanied by his two 
sons, all three of them assuming the name of Smith. He 
made inquiries about land in the vicinity, and, after a 
short sojourn, disappeared. He returned again, in July 
last, and hired a residence, in the midst of a thickly 
settled neighborhood, five miles and a half from the town, 
commonly known as Kennedy's farm. He resided there 
with four other men, who were subsequently joined by 
others. They had no settled business, but were in the 
constant receipt of large numbers of boxes by railroad, 
which have since been proved to have contained Minie 
rifles, percussion caps, stores and ammunition of all kinds, 
field spy-glasses, picks and shovels for throwing up tem- 
porary fortifications, boatswain's whistles and other 
materials of war. The rifles were furnished by the Mas- 
sachusetts Aid Society. Fifteen hundred poles, joointed 
with sharp iron bowie knives, were provided for the use 
of the negroes. Blankets, boots, shoes, clothes and tents, 
were also received in large quantities. 

There seems to have been an abundance of pecuniary 
means. The white prisoners have testified that they 
were " to be well paid for their time and trouble," and a 
negro from Gettysburgh was offered twenty dollars a 
month to join the insurgents. He refused ; and but one 
slave, a man named Gains, is said to have taken a volun- 
tary part in the conspiracy. The party finally consisted 
of twenty-two men, seventeen of whom were' whites, and 
but five colored. They paid in cash for every thing they 
wanted, and professed to pass the greater part of their 
time in hunting. In reality, they were preparing the 
minds of slaves, in the neighborhood, for a revolt, and 
finally imagined, probably, that they had succeeded in 
alienating their affections from their masters and securing 
their co-operation. 



On Sunday, the 16tli of October, tlie whole of the 
twenty-two men inarched stealthily into Harper's Ferry, 
seized upon the government armory, and made two 
wealthy slave-owners — Colonel Washington and Mr. 
Alstadt — as well as several other citizens, prisoners, and 
held them as hostages. The bridge across the Potomac 
was taken possession of and guarded, and a guard was 
also placed at all the avenues. The inhabitants of the 
town found themselves, in the morning, the prisoners of 
twenty-two men, aided by some slaves whom the con- 
spirators had forced during the night to join them. A 
colored railroad porter, named Hayward, was killed for 
refusing to aid the movement. 

As day advanced, the news spread, and people came 
into the Ferry. The first demonstrations of resistance were 
made against the insurrectionists, and, after slaughtering 
another unoffending citizen of a neighboring town, named 
Joseph Barley, and shooting the Mayor of the town, Mr. 
Fountain Beckham, who was unarmed, they withdrew 
into the armory. Immediately afterwards, they shot 
dead Mr. Samuel P. Young, a graduate of West Point, 
and greatly respected for his high character and noble 
qualities. At about noon of Monda}^, however, militia 
from Charlestown, Shepherdstown, and Martinsburg, 
arrived, and, in the course of the afternoon, drove the 
rebels into the engine-house of the Armory buildings, 
killing several of their number. When night set in, ope- 
rations ceased, but guards were placed around the armory 
to prevent escapes. 

The Monday night train from Baltimore, brought 
marines and military, under the command of Colonel 
Lee, of the United States Army, who had been deputized 
by the War Department to put an end to the outbreak. 
His own communication is nearly all that is necessary to 



15 

complete that portion of our narrative wliicli has become 
known in greater detail through the newspaper press. 

Harper's Ferry, Oct. 18. 1859. 

To THE Hon. Secretary of "War — 

I have the honor to report that at seven, A. M., I summoned the rioters 
that liad taken refuge in the Armory building to surrender, promising to 
hold them in security till the pleasure of the President of the United States 
was known. The summons was presented by Lieut. Stewart, First cavalry, 
and declined. A strong party, under command of Lieut. Green, of the ma- 
rines, had been jtreviously posted near the building, and at a concerted signal, 
broke down the door and captured the party. 

Two of the marines were wounded, one mortally I fear, the other slight- 
ly. Two of the rioters were killed and two wounded, Ossawatomie Brown, 
the leader of the party, mortally. One prisoner, and five negroes, said to be 
slaves, and freed from their home ; Mr. Lewis Washington ; Mr. Dangerfield, 
Paymaster's Clerk ; Mr. Ball, Master Machinist ; Mr. Mills, Master Armorer ; 
Dr. Murphy, Paymaster ; Mr. Kiltymeiller, Sui)erintendent'8 Clerk ; Mr. 
Donohue, a railroad clerk, captured by the rioters and held as prisoners, were 
released unhurt. It was the safety of these gentlemen that made me endeavor 
to get the rioters to surrender. I await your instructions. 
Very respectfully, 

K. LEE, Colonel Commandant. 

Of the original party of twenty-two insurgents, fifteen 
were killed and two mortally wounded. Two remained 
unhurt, and three escaj)ed during the night of Monday. 
The purpose of the invaders was entirely foiled. They 
had expected to be joined at once by several thousand 
slaves, while, in truth, they were as little sympathized 
with by the negroes as by their masters. The wild fanat- 
icism of abolitionism, which has convulsed the Union in 
different shapes, for so many years, seems to have been 
the only actuating motive of these misguided, guilty 
tools, of more subtle and dangerous men. That they 
neither needed nor sought for plunder, is proved by their 
having left untouched the large sum which had been de- 
posited, a day before, in the Paymaster's office. To a cor- 
respondent of the New York Times Brown stated, after 
he was captured, that " he had only intended to make 



16 

the first demonstration at Harper's Ferry, when lie ex- 
pected to receive a rapid increase of allies from abolition- 
ists, sufficient to take possession of both, the States of 
Maryland and Virginia, with all of the negroes they could 
capture." He said he had "purposed a general South- 
west course through Virginia, varying as circumstances 
dictated or required." 

The Harper's Ferry rebellion is ended. Most of those 
who participated in it actively are dead, and the remain- 
der Avill probably suffer the penalty, which the laws im- 
pose, for murder and treason. Perhaps a few, who have 
been accessories before the fact, of the crimes perpetrated, 
may also be punished ; but those who have sown the 
seed of evil in the hearts of these fanatics, can only be 
reached by the voice of the people, raised in condemna- 
tion of incendiary doctrines which have produced such 
deplorable results. The principle upon which John 
Brown and his allies acted, is the same which has been 
proclaimed by nearly all the leaders of the Republican 
party, and which inspired the Hon. William H. Seward 
to utter the following words : — 

Our country is a theatre which exhibits in full operation, two radically differ- 
ent political systems — the one resting on the basis of servile or slave labor ; the 
other on the basis of voluntary labor of freemen. The laborers who are en- 
slaved are all negroes, or persons more or less purely of African derivation. 
But this is only accidental. The principle of the system is, that labor, in 
every society, by whomsoever performed, is necessarily unintellectual, grovel- 
ling and base, and that the laborer, equally for his own good and for the wel- 
fare of the State, ought to be enslaved. The white laboring man, whether na- 
tive or foreigner, is not enslaved, only because he cannot, as yet, be reduced 
to bondage. ^4:^;***** 

The slave system is not only intolerant, unjust, and inhuman towards the 
laborer, whom, only because he is a laborer, it loads down with chains, and 
converts into merchandise, but scarcely less so to the fi-eeman, to whom, only 
because he is a laborer from necessity, it denies facilities for employment, and 
whom it expels from the community because it cannot enslave and convert in- 
to merchandise also. ******* 



L 



17 

The slave system is one of constant danger, distrust, suspicion and watch- 
fulness. It debases those whose toil alone can produce wealth and resources 
for defence, to the lowest degree of which human nature is capable, to guard 
against mutiny and insurrection, and thus wastes energies which otherwise 
might be employed in national development and aggrandizement. * 

The two systems are at once perceived to be incongruous. But they are 
more than incongruous— they are incompatible. They have never existed 
permanently together in one country, and they never can. * 

Indeed, so incompatible are the two systems, that every new State which 
is organized within our ever extending domain, makes its first political act a 
choice of the one, and an exclusion of the other, even at the cost of civil war, 
if necessary. The slave States, without law, at the last national election, for- 
bade, within their own limits, even the casting of votes for a candidate for 
President of the United States, supposed to be favorable to the establishment 
of the free labor system in the new States. * * * * 

Thus these antagonistic systems are continually coming into closer contact, 
and collision results. Shall I tell you what this collision means ? They who 
think that it is accidental, unnecessary, the work of interested or fanatical 
agitators, and therefore ephemeral, mistake the case altogether. It is an ir- 
repressible conflict between opposing and enduring forces, and it means that 
the United States must and will, sooner or later, become entirely a slavehold- 
ing nation, or entirely a free labor nation. Either the cotton and rice fields 
of South Carolina and the sugar plantations of Louisiana will ultimately be 
tilled with free labor, and Charleston and New Orleans become marts for 
legitimate merchandize alone, or else the rye fields and wheat fields of Massa- 
chusetts and New York, must again be surrendered by their farmers to slave 
culture and to the production of slaves, and Boston and New York become, 
once more, markets for trade in the bodies and souls of men. 

Carefully examine the signification of these porten- 
tous sentences. Compare them thoughtfully with the 
plan of organization for the abolition of slavery upon our 
previous pages, and you cannot fail to see clearly that 
John Brown has only practised what William H. Seward 
preaches. A recent orator spoke upon this point as fol- 
lows : 

Is it true, do you think, that that insurrection was occasioned by the prin- 
ciples enunciated by Wm. H. Seward ? What can be a more natural con- 
sequence from an adequate cause than that dreadful and atrocious efi'ect ? If 
I should here declare that, after having left this stand, I would march to the 
other side of the river this evening, and would enter my friend and neigh- 
bor's house, and sack it, and destroy it, and murder its inmates, and apply to 
it the torch ; and if in the morning papers you should learn that such events 



18 

have occurred, would you say that those events were noii the natural se- 
quence of my announcement here that they would occur ? No. You would 
hold me accountable for the acts, and properly, too : and so would any court 
of law or any jury of twelve men in all the land. And so, when you heard 
the proclamation at Kochester of the great captain of this irrepressible con- 
flict (ah'eady developed in insurrection) that it must go on — that it must go 
on until tlie whole country shall become either wholly slave or wholly free, 
and when you see upon the heels of that announcement — insurrection, blood- 
shed — a whole village placed under martial law, and men murdered in the 
streets, twelve honest jurors taken from tlie body of the country would pro- 
nounce all these events — the insurrection — the bloodshed and martial law — 
the natural sequence and effect of the principle announced by the very Vetru- 
vius of this unparalleled atrocity. Now, fellow-citizens, although our re- 
publican friends disclaim the act, they approve the treason ; although they 
denounce the traitor, they approve the treason. They proclaim that Ossa- 
watomie Brown is no friend of theirs — he belongs not to their communion 
— but yet one of their principal organs in the city of New York, upon the 
arrival of the news tliat Ossawatomie Brown had perpetrated the outrage, 
virtually proposed its justification, when seeking its excuse in tlie charge, 
that the democratic party had perpetrated similar outrages in Kansas, and 
that this was but their natural requital. 

The black republican press of the country, in fact, 
either openly justifies or lukewarmly condemns the frauds, 
atrocities, and murders connected with the Harper's Ferry 
invasion. The New York Independent defends, as fol- 
lows, the principles upon which John Brown acted : 

That the slaves of the South, whenever they shall have the intelligence 
to plan, and the skill and strength and courage to achieve, a revolution for 
their own emancipation, would be justified in this, no Virginian can deny who 
respects the memory of Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry, or tlie broad 
seal of his own State. Deprived of those " inalienable rights " to " life, lib- 
erty, and the pursuit of happiness," with which " all men are endowed by 
the Creator," sul)jected to every cruelty of oppression, would it be strange if 
some bold, earnest spirit among them should catch the lingering echo of 
Patrick Henry's voice, crying, " Give me liberty, or give me deatli ! " and 
should teach Virginia the meaning of her own motto. Sic semper tyrannis? 
The slaves of the South have the same right to assert their freedom against 
their masters, whenever their strength and resources shall give them a rea- 
sonable hope of success, which the Greeks had to assert their liberties against 
Turkey, or the Italians now have against Austria. The American who would 
deny this had better first burn the Declaration of Independence. If ever 
that day sliall come, as come it will whenever the Union is dissolved, woe 
to tlie cherished institutions and the boasted power of the South. 



19 

The New York Trihime thus expresses its sympathy 
for those who were engaged in the movement : 

There will be enougb to heap execration on the memory of these mis- 
taken men. We leave this work to the fit hands and tongues of those who 
regard the fundamental axioms of the Declaration of Independence as " glit- 
tering generalities." Believing that the way to universal emancipation lies 
not through insurrection, civil war and bloodshed, but through peace, discus- 
sion, and the quiet diffusion of sentiments of humanity and justice, we deeply 
regret this outbreak ; but, remembering that, if their fault was grievous, grie- 
vously have they answered it, we will not, by one reproachful word, disturb 
the bloody shrouds wherein John Brown and his compatriots are sleeping. 
They dared and died for what they felt to be the right, though in a manner 
which seems to us fatally wrong. Let their epitaphs remain unicritten until 
the not distant day, lohen no slave nhall clanl his chains in the shades of Monti- 
cello or ly the groves of Mount Vernon. 

The New York Evening Post casts the blame of the 
Northern raids upon Southern territory on the slave- 
holders themselves. It says : 

In nearly all the Southern States, tlie negroes greatly preponderate in 
number ; many of them, it is true, are too ignorant and stupid to take any 
effective part in an insurrection ; others, too, are profoundly attached to their 
masters or their families ; but, these excepted, there are yet thousands able 
and willing to strike for their emancipation. It has been impossible to keep 
them in entire ignorance of the blessings of freedom, and of the possibility 
of obtaining it by force of arms. The fugitive slaves of the North have 
found means of communicating Avith their old comrades ; the abolitionists 
have spoken to them by pictures, if not by language ; Democratic orators 
have told them falsely that the entire North was engaged in a crusade against 
the South for the sake of the slaves ; and, as servants in the cities, they have 
heard the talk of the parlor and the barrooms, and, in innumerable other ways, 
have been made to think and to desire. When the hour comes, therefore, 
they will not be found either so incapable or so docile as the slaveholders 
seem to suppose. 

But what a condition of society is that in which one-half the population 
constantly menaces the other half with civil war and murder— in which the 
leading classes go to sleep every night, carelessly, it may be, over the crater 
of a volcano, and in which the dangers do not lessen, as in other societies, 
with time, but grow with its growth, until an explosion becomes as inevitable 
as the eruptions of Etna or Vesuvius ! What a condition of society, to be 
extended over the virgin territories of the West— the seat of our future em- 
pire—and for which politicians should clamor and sear their conscience, and 
desperadoes should fight. 



20 

The Albany JEvening Journal considers sucli out- 
breaks " inevitable," and adds : " If a man builds his 
bouse over a volcano, it is not those who warn him of his 
danger that are to blame for its eruptions." 

Thus are respectable and otherwise estimable journals, 
blinded by political partizanship to the enormity of crimes, 
which, under ordinary circumstances, they would be the 
most zealous to denounce. It is this melancholy spectacle 
which has made it our duty to lay before you an unvar- 
nished statement of facts, which otherwise might not be 
correctly presented to you, We have displayed to you 
an abyss, in which, without your aid, not only the pros- 
perity, but the very existence of this Union may be en- 
gulj^hed. The wild record you have read of an associa- 
tion whose ramifications extend throughout the Northern 
States, to blot out slavery by means of civil and servile 
war, is not drawn from imagination — it is a terrible his- 
torical reality. It is for you to decide whether j^ou will 
sanction the overthrow of the federal government, or 
whether you will aid in saving it by your suffrages. 

Fellow-citizens, we implore you to reflect, before casting 
your votes at the coming State election, whether you will 
act patriotically, wisely, for the interests of your wives, 
children, sisters, and of posterity, in aiding to elevate to 
power candidates for office who are either directly or in- 
directly pledged to the support of the doctrine that there 
is an " irrepressible conflict " between the North and the 
South, and that " slavery must go out in fire, rape, and 
slaughters." And, remember, that the endorsement of such 
disunion theories by the State of New York, may pos- 
sibly elevate some individual to the Presidency, the prin- 
ciples of ^hose administration would forbid the suj^pres- 
sion of outrages similar to those which have taken place 
at Harper's Ferry, and by whose misrule the future well- 
being of this now happy country might be destroyed. 



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